


the push and the fall

by Prosodi



Category: Lupin III
Genre: Crossdressing, Explicit Sexual Content, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-31
Updated: 2012-01-31
Packaged: 2017-10-30 10:01:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/330519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prosodi/pseuds/Prosodi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two steps forward and eight steps back -- the elaborate politics of being seduced.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the push and the fall

It takes three tries for Lupin's lighter to strike. "You should fix that," Jigen tells him when he hands it back. Lupin sniffs and tucks it into his jacket pocket.

The weather is cold and dreary and miserable. It has driven them to shelter under one of the canal bridges, the little park walk along the water deserted save for them. For good reason, Jigen thinks. The air is chill and damp already, and the canal does nothing to improve it. His knuckles are swollen and he keeps the hand that he isn't holding his cigarette with stuffed into his armpit. They both shiver and stamp their feet. Jigen's knees ache. Lupin rapidly sucks down two of his Gitanes cigarettes in the time it takes Jigen to get halfway through his; Lupin lights the second off the end of the first. Afterward he stuffs both hands in his pockets and hops from one foot to the other, making small sounds of displeasure over the hum of rain falling on the pavement and in among the boats tethered at points along the canal.

It is too cold by half to do much but they make a show of it anyway: hunching up and down this stretch of water until Lupin finds what he's looking for in a grate that feeds excess water away to prevent flooding. He claps his hands and punches the air, "Bingo!" and then abruptly about faces with a violent sneeze, saying, "Let's get out of this weather."

Later, they wade in through Lupin's run off drain in wet suits, dragging in all the equipment so that at the halfway point they can make a tunnel directly up into the basement of the auction house. Lupin complains about the cold and is still complaining when they're barreling full speed away from the coast in the Fiat, the flash of police lights in the rear view every time they bow around a curve on the mountain road.

Jigen punches him and tells him to stop complaining. Lupin yells, veering wildly into the opposite lane.

"Drive the car!" Jigen shouts and punches him again.

"You drive the car!" Lupin counters, which is idiotic until he clambers out of the drivers seat. Jigen swears repeatedly and grabs the wheel as Lupin pops up through the sunroof to fire a few shots at the convoy on their tail.

The Fiat swerves around the corner, steering erratic. Jigen can hear Lupin swearing -- "Damn damn, shit, damn. I can feel a cold coming on! Crap!" -- and firing a round every other word. The curve in the road ends. The guardrail falls rapidly away behind them.

"Lupin!" Jigen shouts before he steers the Fiat off the edge of the road. A moment of weightlessness: he catches Lupin by the tail of his jacket and jerks him back into the car.

The Fiat slams into the hillside and flies down the embankment, bouncing over stones and ledges on the way down. Jigen is too busy with the rapidly approaching tree line to bother looking back to see what became of their tail. He doubts they'll follow here.

Lupin scrambles back into the driver's seat. His teeth are bared, the Walther gripped in his mouth. Both his hands clap down onto the steering wheel. He shouts through his teeth: a wordless howl of madness as the Fiat plummets into the densely wooded tree line. Jigen braces himself against the dashboard and prepares for a crash that doesn't come.

It isn't until later, the battered Fiat having somehow managed to limp it's way to the little cabin in the valley, after they have stowed the collection of pocket sized paintings under a floorboard that Lupin seems to settle. He stretches out like a cat on the floor near the fireplace and rests his cheek on his arm. He breathes out of his mouth and sniffs occasionally, rubbing his nose.

"Want one?" Jigen mumbles around the stem of his pipe as he pours himself a glass of scotch.

Lupin says, "Sure." Jigen pours a second glass. He sets it near Lupin's elbow, though Lupin only takes a few sips before he forgets about it. Lupin has one leg crooked up; his heel gently stirs the air. Jigen, sitting in the lone armchair nursing his pipe and his glass, can see how Lupin absently strokes his jaw with his thumb.

"Teeth rattled?" Jigen tries to ask him.

"No," he murmurs. His voice is even more nasal than usual. He might really have a cold, Jigen thinks.

In the morning Jigen wakes up to find the cabin miserably hot. He immediately strips off his night clothes and prowls down from the loft in his underwear to growl at Lupin. He finds the thief asleep in the armchair, red in the face and almost invisible under the quilt. Lupin's breathing sounds thick and sticky and he doesn't stir when Jigen, ready to be angry, instead touches his forehead with the back of his hand.

"How inconsiderate," Jigen grumbles.

Lupin is miserably sick for a week straight. Jigen gives him hot broth in a cup in the morning, a certain lackadaisical air to the way he hands him the mug. Lupin, propped up in the pillows, makes pathetic wheezing sounds as he weakly sips at it. "This is too salty," he whines and sinks further back into the pillows.

"It was your idea to go diving in canals in the winter," Jigen reminds him.

"I'm bored with being sick," Lupin says another day, half addled from being feverish and running on nothing but broth. The blanket is pulled all the way to his chin; he looks comically narrow under it, his long skinny limbs lost in the wrinkles. "Are you fixing the Fiat? You should be. I want it fixed," he snaps, surly.

"I'm not touching that thing. You're too particular about the things that need to be done."

"Entertain me. I'm bored."  
"I'm not a circus act."  
"Jigen-chan, it's the law! You have to listen to a sick person and do what they ask!"  
"Go back to sleep Lupin."  
"I just woke up."  
"I'm going to strangle you until you're unconscious then."  
"Ay-yi, okay!"

Jigen crouches near the fireplace, watching the kettle. The metal is hot even through the dish towel, so he doesn't do much beyond poke the handle experimentally now and again and turn the mugs near his knee with his other hand. Making coffee is the sort of thing he finds easier to do over a campfire; Jigen doesn't know why it makes a difference, but somehow it does.

Lupin, nesting in a pile of blankets on the rug, has been talking for the past half hour. He says nothing in particular and doesn't seem to mind that Jigen is only half listening, murmuring in agreement when it seems appropriate. "Did you know that Napoleon carried those paintings with him all over Europe? Imagine holding a candle for a woman like that."

Jigen snorts and smiles a little to himself. "Josephine was a bitch," he begins to say.

Except Lupin suddenly rears up out of his blankets, steadying himself by slapping a hand on the floor. "I'm cold," he says.

"Lay back down," Jigen tries to tell him without looking back. He prods the kettle. Is that the water beginning to bubble?

"My hands are cold," Lupin clarifies, as if it matters.

"Put them in your armpits."

Lupin lays back down and must do so, though a moment later he grumbles, "They're still cold."

Jigen throws down the dish towel and abandons the kettle, twisting over. He sits down on the rug dear Lupin who glares at him from under the edge of the blanket. Even feverish and nonsensical, Lupin has no patience for laying around. This stasis is wearing his temper thin; Jigen can tell by the way he shifts constantly under his blankets that he is frustrated, more fidgety when he's tired and sick. Bored and erratic. Jigen puts out his hands, palms up. "Right hand first," he orders. He does his best to make it sound chastising.

Lupin does so immediately, his sweaty hand slithering out from under the blankets and into Jigen's. His skin is clammy and his palms pale, though his hand doesn't feel cold. Jigen doesn't question it. Instead, he clasps Lupin's hand and begins to rub it fiercely between his for a few moments.

"Alright?" he asks. Lupin grunts and takes it back, promptly putting out his left for the same treatment.

Lupin's knees and elbows create a miniature mountain range under the cover of the blanket. Jigen allows himself to absentmindedly study the angles as he rubs Lupin's hand between his. Lupin's knuckles are swollen, his palms rough with calluses. His strong fingers are limp from sickness. Jigen glances back and is startled when he locks eyes with Lupin. He is bright eyed and flush from the flu, eyes half hooded. Jigen releases his hand though Lupin doesn't immediately pull it back under the blankets. Instead he lets it linger there: palm up, knuckles light against the heel of Jigen's hand.

"Lupin," he says, a gentle reminder. The kettle his starting to hiss. Lupin makes a tired noise, his voice thick, his eyes having dropped to where their hands as touching.

"Thank you dear," he says as breezily as he can manage with his stuffed up sinuses. Jigen carefully tucks his hand back in under the blankets for him and then shifts back to pull the kettle out of the fire.

He thinks he can feel Lupin's eyes on him for the rest of the day.

The day after he spends some time outdoors under the Fiat, evaluating the damage. He makes a list of every bump and scrape. When he is done he squirms out from under the car and goes comes inside reeking of motor oil and sweat. He takes the list to Lupin who seems at least attentive if not steady. Jigen was watched him go to vomit in the bathroom on trembling legs three times in the morning and if glad that Lupin has at least decided to stay sitting inside instead of joining him for the Fiat's evaluation.

They talk over the list for a few minutes, the paper perched between Lupin’s thumb and forefinger. When they are done, Jigen goes to grab it out of Lupin's hands and he twitches it away. Jigen follows with a growl, leaning closer to reach just as Lupin turns his face. It's an effective ploy, more so because Jigen doesn't expect it and so doesn't flinch away when Lupin's other hand weakly finds his shirt collar. He hooks two fingers there. Just as quickly, Lupin's mouth is at the corner of Jigen's lips: pressing.

His breath is hot and thin and his touch is light. His knuckles brush against Jigen's throat. Jigen's hand closes on Lupin's wrist instead of the paper. He turns his head slightly. Lupin's mouth bumps along his. The kiss is no longer so crooked or so light. Lupin begins to part his lips a little more either to breathe in around his stuffed nose or to use his tongue.

Jigen's other hand finds the center of Lupin's chest. He shoves him back into the chair. It takes him a moment longer the jerk away, abandoning all contact entirely.

"Jigen--"

"What the hell is wrong with you?" The back of Jigen’s neck is hot and his lips feel unnaturally swollen. He quickly wipes the back of his hand across his mouth.

Lupin's face is open, shoulders canted under the weight of the blanket around his body. He looks almost startled. After a moment Lupin rubs his sternum. "You shouldn't drive the car to get the parts," he says without looking away, lip curling.

"Fuck you," Jigen spits. He snatches the list out of Lupin's hand and immediately goes outside. He takes the Fiat though it whines and shudders the whole way to the village and back

Jigen spends some time in the yard, going through the motions of tending to the abused Fiat though he hardly does much beyond walk around the little car and kick the tires. When he does finally go inside, he is unsurprised - relieved even - to find that Lupin has clawed his way into the loft and is likely asleep or at least pretending to be.

The next day Lupin shrugs into his clothes and comes down as Jigen is putting coffee on. Lupin spreads marmalade on toast and grinning says, "I could eat a horse!"

Jigen doesn't ask and Lupin doesn't say anything. They spend the next two days piecing the car back together and when they are done, they take the little paintings of Josephine and they go North.

After two days in Sweden they find a fence for the paintings and so spend the next three weeks doing absolutely nothing that's free. Jigen buys expensive liquor and a case of his favorite cigars. They book separate hotel rooms and have breakfast and lunch in lounges and cafes all over the city. Lupin takes a string of increasingly pretty women out to expensive dinners. Jigen sees at least two of them waiting for the elevator in the early hours of the morning, their hair mussed. One, a blonde with thick wrists and magnificent tits, stays long enough to have breakfast with them. She says hello to him but that is the extent of her English and Jigen knows only a bare minimum of Swedish, so after limping along in Russian for a few minutes the conversation quickly turns to Lupin telling her dirty jokes and squeezing her knee under the table.

Jigen doesn't know for sure how many times Lupin sees her after that, but when they leave Gothenburg she comes to the hotel lobby and wishes Lupin a teary goodbye. She kisses him repeatedly on both cheeks while Lupin reels off a list of platitudes that Jigen needs no translation for: he'll be back to visit, he'll call every day.

It is exactly a month after Lupin's sickness in the Netherlands that, as they are making their escape across an ornate hotel rooftop in Hong Kong, a number of roof tiles come loose under Jigen. He loses his footing and with a shout goes sliding. Before he can frantically claw after a handhold, the roof is suddenly gone.

It takes less than four seconds to fall thirteen stories. Jigen doesn't know how fast Lupin would have to move to catch him before he falls out of arm's reach, but he does. The force of it wrenches Jigen's shoulder out of place. He screams. His fingers go limp. Lupin struggles, his hand sliding on the fabric of Jigen's sleeve. There's a pop of thread as the stitching starts to come undone.

Jigen's body sways as his legs instinctively paddle through the air. It takes him a long time to lift his other hand and grab hold of Lupin's arm. He doesn't know how he gets back on the roof, just that eventually he does and afterwards he can hardly believe that he fell. He staggers around for a few seconds numbly holding his dislocated arm until Lupin finally catches him by the lapel and shouts his name very close to his face. "Careful, my arm hurts too much to save you again," he warns with a manic laugh. Before Lupin can release him, Jigen kisses him hard on the mouth. A moment later he recoils, stares at Lupin, and then clumsily leads the way down.

At the shithole of a hotel they're in, Lupin resets his shoulder. Jigen muffles the sound he makes by digging his teeth into his hand though that does nothing to mask the grotesque pop his shoulder makes as it rocks back into place. Lupin makes him a sling from one of the bed sheets. "No more falling off rooftops," he chastises playfully, grinning and smirking. Jigen takes a handful of pain medication and falls asleep quickly while Lupin nominally watches the early morning news, but mostly watches him.

They are in Bangkok. It's unbelievably humid and the air in the place where they're staying is threatening to choke him. Jigen's arm is hot in the sling; it makes him irritable. More frustrating is that it is only fractionally cooler after the sun has set. Jigen feels incapable and worthless without both hands - can barely even clean his gun - and so it doesn't take long before he rolls to his feet and shrugs his good arm into his jacket, draping the other half ineffectually over his shoulder. "I'm going out," he tells Lupin, who is knee deep in books and only makes a vague noise in response. Jigen goes and hunts down the nearest bar.

He drinks until the heat of the day melts off of him, replaced by a pleasant warmth of alcohol and the buzz of being slightly drunk. The bar is loud, filled by mostly locals, and the later it gets the longer it takes to get a fourth and fifth drink. It isn't until he's moved on to some locally brewed beer that he suspects might be piss from the smell but can't actually taste that he realizes the same woman has been sitting on the barstool next to him for at least twenty minutes. Jigen glances sideways at her. Her blonde hair is immediately jarring. He is still processing it when she takes a pack of cigarettes from her purse, deftly knocking one loose. He doesn't need to really look at the pack; he thinks he would recognize the Gitanes logo in the dark.

Before she can light her cigarette, Jigen finds his lighter and strikes it. It sparks in one, the light dashing across what is a familiar nose and cheekbones, catching Lupin's dark eyes. Lupin smiles faintly at him and takes a few drags from his cigarette.

They sit in silence while Lupin smokes and Jigen finishes his beer. The hum of the bar presses in from either side and they don't look at one another. After some time, Jigen struggles briefly with his wallet and leaves his money under the empty bottle. He slides off the stool. Lupin delicately stubs his cigarette out in the ashtray and follows.

Jigen shoves him into the first alley they come across, driving him back behind the dumpsters and against the cement wall. He kisses Lupin desperately. Lupin makes a sharp noise, pants, and fumbles for his belt. Jigen swears into his mouth, gropes at his waist and grinds his thigh between Lupin's leg. He can feel how hard he is through the thin material of the dress. He pulls up the skirt and touches him roughly on the thigh and hip. Lupin's breath is hot in his mouth and his kisses feverish. After a few moments Jigen uses one hand to turn him over, pins Lupin to the wall and shoves down the thin red panties he's wearing. Jigen spits on his fingers; Lupin makes a raw groaning noise when he presses them in.

It's awkward to do with one hand. After only a few hasty thrusts with his fingers, Lupin reaches between them and catches his dick. Jigen grunts, pulls his fingers out. He lets Lupin help guide him, both their hands there to steady him as Jigen eases into him, unbelievably tight. Lupin makes no pretense of keeping quiet when he does it. He says, "Oh," and "Fuck," and "Jigen," and the sound is so loud. He only gets louder when Jigen begins to fuck him outright.

He comes embarrassingly fast: just a handful of erratic thrusts and then Jigen seizes up. After a moment he fumbles between Lupin and the wall, reaching for the erection he knows is there. Lupin groans as he pulls out, catches Jigen's wrist. "Wait, no," he says. Shaking, he pulls his underwear back up and tugs his dress down.

Jigen can hardly walk straight and Lupin limps back to the hotel. Jigen doesn't know if it's from the erection Lupin is hiding behind his purse or if it's from the less than gentle fucking, but his brain is too scrambled to think about asking. He floats alongside Lupin, terminally brain dead, and is only just starting to come to as they go up the stairs to the hotel room.

When the door closes behind them Jigen immediately goes to kiss him again, but Lupin turns his face away. "Go sit down." And because Jigen doesn't know what else to do, he retreats to the edge of the nearest bed and watches as Lupin pulls off the blonde wig and wipes his lipstick off on a napkin. He gets naked with an efficiency that would be impressive if not for the fact that it just...was...: shedding the dress and the underwear, the padding around his chest and hips. When he turns his attention back to Jigen, there are still faint traces of makeup on his mouth and eyes. His nails are still painted.

"At least take your clothes off," Lupin says, snorts like he's making fun of how slow Jigen is.

"Oh. Sure," he says as if legitimately ashamed. He painstakingly begins to take his clothes off, struggling to do so one handed. After a moment, Lupin goes over to him and helps him out of his shirt and slacks. Jigen takes the opportunity to touch Lupin's naked hip, to press his thumb against the pale skin. Lupin makes a low noise when Jigen touches his half hard dick. His hand catches Jigen in the center of the chest and he shoves him. Jigen falls back onto the mattress.

Lupin forces his legs apart with a careless touch to his knee. Jigen can feel his dick twitch a little in expectation as Lupin's hand roams to his inner thigh.

"You better not punch me or anything in the morning," Lupin complains, though Jigen hardly hears him. He just says "Yes," when Lupin uses one hand to pin him to the mattress and with the other presses a finger into him.

It doesn't feel good so much as just strange and vaguely uncomfortable. With his legs sprawled, feeling exposed and awkward, Jigen begins to wish Lupin would lean down so he could at least kiss his mouth or taste the powder of the makeup on his cheek. Instead Lupin regards him with a serious expression. A few moments later he adds a second finger. Jigen winces. He shifts and clutches his bad arm, trying to keep it from pressing painfully up into the weakened joint of his shoulder.

He thinks it takes longer than it should and any hope of achieving another erection has mostly been forgotten by the time Lupin pulls his fingers out. Jigen shifts his hips, huffs, and frowns. His mouth is dry though he has caught his breath; his chest rises and falls slow, steady, and his heart is no longer hammering in his chest.

Lupin pauses then, leaning forward over him. The shadow of his body is oddly comforting and Jigen tips his chin toward him. "Alright?" Lupin asks, shockingly conversational.

"Sure." He would shrug if it wasn't for the shoulder and the sling.

"Good," is all Lupin says before he spits in his palm and reaches down between them. A moment later Jigen's waning attention narrows to a point. He makes a startled sound like being punched as Lupin pushes into him with a grunt. Jigen scrabbles at him, grips Lupin's elbow. It hurts. Lupin pauses, his breath hitching. After a moment he moves to bury himself completely. Jigen shudders, pants, suddenly incapable as his body tenses and gives. He can't let go of Lupin's arm. After a few moments of Lupin’s body hot between his legs, skin on skin, he breathes out ragged and hears every note of the hoarse sound he makes.

Lupin seems to take that to meant something and slowly begins to make lazy short thrusts into him. It's jarring and painful; Jigen sighs through his grit teeth. Lupin spits on his palm again and pulls out halfway. It helps a little, though the pace still only limps along.

\--Or does until Lupin shifts a little, drops the angle of his hips and simultaneously catches Jigen by the thigh and pulls him up a little to meet the rock of his thrust. It's like having the air knocked out of him. A low noise thuds out of him, coughed straight from Jigen’s chest; his hips buck up against Lupin involuntarily, the small of his back coming off the mattress. Lupin, the fucker, grins like a goddamn moron and does it again. It drives a noise out of Jigen that is sharp and too high and something he should be embarrassed about. Instead he just feels his legs bow open and his thumb presses against the soft crook of Lupin's elbow. He swears dully, voice thick. Lupin laughs, pausing to kiss him.

Jigen mumbles clumsily against his mouth. He says, "I'm going to strangle you if you stop."

He can feel the curve of Lupin's mouth, how he grins smugly. His calloused hand tightens on Jigen's hip. "Ay-yi, okay," Lupin whines. He kisses him once more.


End file.
